The present invention generally relates to computer systems, and more particularly to executing collaborative application software in a computer network.
Computer networks have become an important platform for storing and delivering application programs to users. In a model widely referred to as client/server, an application server is considered a central hub from which a number of clients can request and receive application software for performing a specific function. In the past, most applications were executed locally at a client, with application software that was locally stored in the client platform. Today, however, in one configuration, applications are stored in a central server, and delivered to a client in components for local processing. Another common configuration is for the client to send processing requests to the server, which executes the application that is specified in the request on the server and sends the results back to the client for local processing. In this configuration, the application is maintained in the server.
The tremendous growth of use of the Internet and World Wide Web (the “Web”) in the past few years has resulted in increasingly more communication between clients and servers. Most of the communications in the short history of the Web relate to delivery of requested content data from a web server to a client. A web server is a specialized type of server that communicates according to a particular protocol, the hypertext transport protocol, or HTTP. Other hypermedia protocols are also used or are being developed.
Traditionally, Internet-based application processing in a client/server model occurs mostly through a web server. Network-based applications for the client/server model, such as those through the Web, are becoming increasingly complex and interactive. Problems with current software infrastructure for administering network-based applications include difficulty in the creation and delivery of application components, complexities of managing the interface between a client and a server, and processing delays and inefficiencies. The current and next generations of the Web, in its Internet, intranet and extranet embodiments, demand a platform-neutral architecture that can effectively handle complex Web-based distributed client/server applications for collaborative processing.